21.58Sir Richard Branson has written about his admiration for Steve Jobs in Friday's Daily Telegraph. He says:

Leadership doesn’t have a secret formula; all true leaders go about things in their own way. It’s this ability to think differently that sets them apart – and that enabled Steve Jobs to create perhaps the most respected brand in the world.

21.53 We've back after a technical fault here at The Telegraph. Steve Jobs wouldn't have stood for it, you can be sure of that.

20.43 After Steve Jobs returned to Apple, the firm ran a TV advertising campaign called "Think Different", featuring rebellious historical figures such as Martin Luther King, Ghandi, Einstein, and Picasso. The actor Richard Dreyfuss did the voiceover for the version that aired, but Steve Jobs also recorded a version that was never broadcast. It seems to sum up much about his approach to life and business. Here it is:

20.25 Stephen Wolfram, the British scientist and creator of Mathematica, a software package widely used in research, and the Wolfram Alpha knowledge search engine, was a friend of Jobs and worked with Apple on many projects. For example, Wolfram Alpha is an important part of Siri, the iPhone 4S' voice-controlled personal assistant.

I first met Steve Jobs in 1987, when he was quietly building his first NeXT computer, and I was quietly building the first version of Mathematica. A mutual friend had made the introduction, and Steve Jobs wasted no time in saying that he was planning to make the definitive computer for higher education, and he wanted Mathematica to be part of it.

Actually, it wasn’t yet called Mathematica then, and one of the big topics of discussion was what it should be called. At first it had been Omega (yes, like Alpha) and later PolyMath. Steve thought those were lousy names. I gave him lists of names I’d considered, and pressed him for his suggestions. For a while he wouldn’t suggest anything. But then one day he said to me: “You should call it Mathematica”.

There is much that I am grateful to Steve Jobs for. But tragically, his greatest contribution to my latest life project - Wolfram Alpha - happened just yesterday: the announcement that Wolfram Alpha will be used in Siri on the iPhone 4S.

Wolfram also found the business card he kept from that first meeting. Here it is:

Where Zuckerberg most resembles Jobs is in the strength of conviction he places in his vision. In a world where consumers have ever more choice and an ever louder voice. Jobs always knew that customers who thought they wanted lots of buttons and a removable battery would be seduced by the simplicity and beauty of his devices. You saw that confidence as recently as this week, when Apple held its fire and rolled out the iPhone 4GS rather than rush out a 5G version, as everyone was expecting.

Likewise, Zuckerberg has managed to court the masses without ever submitting to the so-called wisdom of the crowd.

19.57 In afternoon trading in New York, Apple stock is fairly stable, down between 0.5 and one per cent. The markets haven't taken Jobs' death as negatively as many analysts expected when he quit as CEO; the intervening months and widely-held sense that the end was near for him seem to have softened the blow.

19.23 This is the middle part of Business Week's three-part Steve Jobs saga. It covers the least-well known part of his career, between 1985, after he had been ousted from Apple by a boardroom coup and before he made his triumphant return in 1997. In many ways it's the most interesting, revealing how he ran NeXT and Pixar, and the failures and tribulations that helped him on his return to Apple.

By all accounts, Jobs had entered a contented middle age, the Sturm und Drang of his Apple days now fading into history. During an appearance to promote Toy Story‘s DVD release on Oct. 30, 1996, Jobs was asked by Charlie Rose whether Apple could turn itself around. “It’s just a spectator sport for me now,” said Jobs

“If you can’t come up with something more than this whining, you’re out.”

Those closing words in an email were the first that I received from Steve Jobs when he returned to Apple as CEO. At the time, I was a PR firm’s managing director in charge of the Apple account, and had penned a “welcome back” email that outlined the status of where things stood.

We had nothing to lose so, in response, I wrote an email from my personal account, subject titled “10 Things Apple Must Do.” I remember very well the first one - after years of floundering under his successors, I wrote: “Apple has no vision. Get one.” Boy, did he!

Jobs will be remembered both for the life-changing products he created and for the fact that he was able to sit down, think clearly, and execute his ideas - attributes he shared with no other U.S. citizen.

18.24 Jobs' biographer, Walter Isaccson, has written for Time magazine(subscription required) about how he got the job. He was first invited back in 2004.

Because I assumed that he was still in the middle of an oscillating career that had many more ups and downs left, I demurred. Not now, I said. Maybe in a decade or two, when you retire.

But I later realized that he had called me just before he was going to be operated on for cancer for the first time. As I watched him battle that disease, with an awesome intensity combined with an astonishing emotional romanticism, I came to find him deeply compelling, and I realized how much his personality was ingrained in the products he created. His passions, demons, desires, artistry, devilry and obsession for control were integrally connected to his approach to business, so I decided to try to write his tale as a case study in creativity.

18.12 Google executive Vic Gundotra has re-posted a famous story about a call he received from Steve Jobs on a sunday in the run-up to the release of the iPhone.

"So Vic, we have an urgent issue, one that I need addressed right away. I've already assigned someone from my team to help you, and I hope you can fix this tomorrow" said Steve.

"I've been looking at the Google logo on the iPhone and I'm not happy with the icon. The second O in Google doesn't have the right yellow gradient. It's just wrong and I'm going to have Greg fix it tomorrow. Is that okay with you?"

When I think about leadership, passion and attention to detail, I think back to the call I received from Steve Jobs on a Sunday morning in January. It was a lesson I'll never forget. CEOs should care about details. Even shades of yellow. On a Sunday.

17.56 Jobs was arguably at the height of his powers when Apple introduced the first, revolutionary iPhone in 2007. His masterful presentation created a frenzy of excitement around the device and catapulted his firm to a new level of public awareness and profit. Here's a reminder:

17.45 The US magazine Business Week has a good piece on Jobs' "third act" - his return to Apple in 1997 up to his death yesterday. It end with a nod to Jobs' famed "reality distortion field".

Rumors about Jobs’s health had been buzzing around Silicon Valley all year, but anyone who knew him and read that resignation letter understood the end was near. He had been so good at distorting reality, so good at bending everyone - competitors, consumers, the press, and especially himself - to see the world his way. By relinquishing control, Jobs acknowledged that he had finally met the one force he could not charm or bully or out-think: his own mortality.

The proposed invention describes a dynamic context-sensitive software icon or button that would be presented to users in different fashions. By doing this, an application could help prevent a user from accidentally initiating a task on their computer.

The filing notes that users sometimes engage in activities on their computer that cannot be stopped once they are started, like formatting a disk. In another example, if a system starts burning data to a DVD-ROM or CD-ROM, the operation cannot be stopped without ruining the disc, as the data cannot be rewritten.

17.09 Apple stock is now trading up almost one percent in New York.

16:52 Jobs in his own words:"Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice." - Stanford university, 2005

16:26 Back in 2004, Jobs made an unexpected appearance at the launch of an iPod at Billingsgate fish market in London, according to Beehive City.

It was always accepted wisdom that Jobs didn’t really like England very much, and one journalist piped up at the press conference to ask him if it was true.

Before iTunes, music executives had failed to be convinced about the success of an online music market. But coupled with Apple's hugely-successful iPod - launched just two years earlier - Steve Jobs proved it was a market worth exploring.

The product was an immediate success selling one million songs in its first week and by December it had sold 25 million songs. In 2010 iTune song downloads hit 10 billion.

15:40 Jobs in his own words:"Death is very likely the single best invention of life"

15:35Jobs’ death has prompted his book publishers Simon & Schuster to move up the publication date forward a month to October 24 for his much-anticipated biography. Unsurprisingly, pre-orders for the biography "Steve Jobs" are skyrocketing, and the title now tops bestseller lists at both Amazon and Apple’s iTunes.

15:11 The Telegraph's Ben Bryant tweets:@benbryant It's pretty amazing that Jobs managed to get everybody to pay for music when it's freely available.

15:07 Jobs in his own words:"There's nothing that makes my day more than getting an e-mail from some random person who just bought an iPad over in the UK and tells me the story about how it's the coolest product they've ever brought home in their lives. That's what keeps me going. It's what kept me five years ago [when he was diagnosed with cancer], it's what kept me going 10 years ago when the doors were almost closed. And it's what will keep me going five years from now whatever happens." - AllThingsD Conference, 2010

15:00 Some wonderful photos of reader memories of Jobs have been sent in to the New York Times.

14:53 The death of Apple's inspirational leader is likely to have a deep impact on the technology giant behind the iPod, iPhone and iPad, giving rivals a greater chance of catching up, says Reuters.

Steve Jobs' creative spirit was so closely tied to the fortunes of Apple that his death raises questions about the company's ability to keep its pipeline of transformational products running at such a fast pace.

"As a technology analyst, I am sorry for his death. It was Jobs' Apple, not Apple's Jobs," said Kim Young-chan, an analyst at Shinhan Investment in Seoul.

14:47 Apple shares jumped 1.5pc to $378.25 at the start of trading on Wall Street.

14:43 A wonderful little clip of Jobs playing a "software dating game" with Bill Gates.

The abundance of iPhones, iPads and iPods today makes it easy to forget that Apple wasn't always popular. If you owned a Macintosh before 1998, you were either a creative-type with expensive specialist software, a school or a member of the devoted but small 'Cult of Mac'. Before Jobs returned in 1997, the company was in a desperate state.

In 1996 Michael Dell, Apple's historical rival in the desktop computer space, famously said he would 'shut [Apple] down and give the money back to the shareholders' if he was in charge. Gil Amelio, Apple's CEO for 500 days between 1996 and 1997, was said to have told Jobs that 'Apple is like a ship with a hole in the bottom, leaking water'. And Steve Jobs himself said "the company had a decade in which it took a nap" between his ousting and his return.

14:19 In Egypt, Wael Ghonim - a former Google executive who used social media to jump-start social change in Egypt - also honored Jobs via Twitter, saying: "He was truly inspiring. His company helped change the world. Good bye Steve Jobs."

14:13 Not sure Westboro Baptist Church's Margie Phelps, who featured on Louis Theroux's America's Most Hated Family for her extreme views, has realised the irony of this Twitter post:

14:10 Apple shares, down as much as 5pc in Germany after news of Steve Jobs' death, are now trading up 0.2pc in Frankfurt ahead of the start of Wall Street open.

14:07 David Cameron saying the Apple co-founder has inspired future generations of inventors and entrepreneurs - something eh spoke about in his speech at the Tory Party Conference yesterday.

13:54 The ripples of Steve Jobs' death have spread a little wider than expected. Apparently the Foreign Office has cancelled a briefing for journalists today on the London Conference on Cyberspace, a big diplomatic conference they're having at the beginning of November hosted by Wiliam Hague, because of the news.

13:26 One Apple enthusiast Jonathan Moss has tweeted:

@jwmoss Steve Jobs was born out of wedlock, put up for adoption at birth, dropped out of college, then changed the world. What's your excuse?

The most influential promoter of Steve Jobs' indispensability, of course, is Steve Jobs. But another person who is very much with that program is the one executive who has actually filled in for Jobs as CEO. That would be Tim Cook, Apple's chief operating officer and its interim chief executive for two months in 2004, when Jobs was recovering from cancer surgery.

'Come on, replace Steve? No. He's irreplaceable,' Cook said recently, according to a person who knows him well. 'That's something people have to get over. I see Steve there with gray hair in his 70s, long after I'm retired.'

13:15 Lord Sugar: "Jobs was a techno-marketing genius"

13:13 Google's own subtle tribute:

13:08 From Lord Norman Foster, chairman and founder of Foster and Partners:

We were greatly privileged to know Steve as a person, as a friend and in every way so much more than a client. Steve was an inspiration and a role model. He encouraged us to develop new ways of looking at design to reflect his unique ability to weave backwards and forwards between grand strategy and the minutiae of the tiniest of internal fittings.

He was the ultimate perfectionist and demanded of himself as he demanded of others. We are better as individuals and certainly wiser as architects through the experience of the last two years and more of working for him. His participation was so intense and creative that our memory will be that of working with one of the truly great designers and mentors.

13:07 Social media guru Andy Carvin tweets: @andycarvinRIP Steve Jobs"' is trending worldwide on Twitter. In truth, he's been trending for over 30 years. #RIPstevejobs

13:00 The Telegraph's Alexis Dormancy asks how does Jobs do it?I met Steve Jobs a couple of times in 2005, to talk about mobile phones. This was two years before the iPhone was launched. At the time it was rumoured it would be within three months. He wouldn’t launch the iPhone until it met his standards. The experience changed the way I look at businesses and leadership.

What was it about Steve Jobs that meant he managed to transform four industries? The personal computer (Mac), music (iPod), mobile phones (iPhone) and computing as lifestyle (iPad) will never be the same again – and that's before we mention his creation of another $7bn company in Pixar, which has won more than 20 Academy Awards. If he’d achieved just one of those feats, he would be one of the greatest business people of this era. To have achieved all of them is more than just talent and luck – it’s doing things differently.

12:55 TIME magazine will release its new issue today, which will feature Steve Jobs on the cover. This will be the 8th time Jobs has appeared.

12:35 We have just been sent this from NET Patient Foundation, a charity in the UK that supports patients with neuroendocrine tumours. I feel it is very important that it is made clear that Steve Jobs suffered from a pancreatic neuroendocrine tumour, not pancreatic cancer.

We were very saddened to hear that Steve Jobs had lost his battle with pancreatic neuroendocrine tumour. Our thoughts go out to his family, friends and colleagues.

12:25 Data reporter Conrad Quilty-Harper has this graph, which represents Apple's days as an underdog.

Until late 2004 the company's market value barely registered against giants like Dell and Microsoft. The release of the iMac and later, the iPod, reversed the company's fortunes. Apple is now the second most valuable company in the world by market cap.

12:20 Jobsin his own words:"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

"Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart." – Stanford commencement speech 2005

12:11 Outside Jobs' house in Palo Alto, neighbors and friends have left flowers and have drawn messages with markers on the sidewalk. "Thanks for changing the world," reads one.

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak founded Apple in Steve Jobs’s house in January 1976, brought together by friendship and mutual respect at meetings of the Homebrew Computer Club, birthplace of so many early silicon valley ventures.

Their first product, the Apple 1, was demonstrated to the a meeting of the Homebrew Club in the spring of 1976. Accounts of where and when the demonstration took place vary - some say April fools’ day, but the club’s newsletters only note a meeting on March 31. The Sonoma County branch of the club notes an appearance by the Apple computer in April and thanks Steve Wozniak for the transportation.

There's no doubt that Jobs deserves a front-row seat in the pantheon of great inventors and entrepreneurs in history. In the 35 years since he founded Apple, he created the Apple II, the iMac, iPod, iPhone and most recently, the iPad – five products that transformed the technological, music, film, TV, gaming and publishing industries. Few could claim to have even developed a single such product.

But there's another person whom we could compare Steve Jobs to who's a little closer to home: Sir Christopher Wren. One of the greatest architects in history, Wren was responsible for building St. Paul's Cathedral as well as dozens of other churches, libraries, palaces, and hospitals across the country. Like Wren, who had interests in astronomy, biology, and physics, Steve Jobs was not 'only' a computer engineer or a programmer, but he had a deep love and appreciation of the importance of design and the humanities when it came to making objects that real people had to use.

According to a participant inside a meeting about the panned MobileMe service, Jobs walked in, clad in his trademark black mock turtleneck and blue jeans, clasped his hands together, and asked a simple question: 'Can anyone tell me what MobileMe is supposed to do?' Having received a satisfactory answer, he continued, "So why the fuck doesn't it do that?"

For the next half-hour Jobs berated the group. 'You've tarnished Apple's reputation,' he told them. 'You should hate each other for having let each other down.' The public humiliation particularly infuriated Jobs.

Fortune said Jobs' handling of the MobileMe debacle offers a rare glimpse of how Apple (AAPL) really operates. To Apple's legion of admirers, the company is like a tech version of Wonka's factory, an enigmatic but enchanted place that produces wonderful items they can't get enough of.

11:02 Here's a chart showing the average Apple share price per year since Steve Jobs returned to the company in 1997

10:44 Dick Costolo, CEO of Twitter: "Once in a rare while, somebody comes along who doesn't just raise the bar, they create an entirely new standard of measurement."

10:40 Former prime minister Tony Blair pays tribute to an "extraordinary and creative human being, an inspiration and an innovator who believed that by the power of ideas the world could be transformed."

He said: "As much as anyone in any walk of life in the early 21st century he changed people's lives simply by imagination and determination. His memory will serve as a symbol of what the human mind can achieve."

10:27 Steven Levy, a technology writer at Wired, says it had taken a while for the world to realisewhat an amazing treasure Steve Jobs was. But Jobs knew it all along.As a child of the sixties who was nurtured in Silicon Valley, his career merged the two strains in a way that reimagined business itself. And he did it as if he didn’t give a damn who he pissed off. He could bully underlings and corporate giants with the same contempt.

But when he chose to charm, he was almost irresistible. His friend, Heidi Roizen, once gave advice to a fellow Apple employee that the only way to avoid falling prey to the dual attacks of venom and charm at all hours was not to answer the phone. That didn’t work, the employee said, because Jobs lived only a few blocks away. Jobs would bang on the door and not go away.

The Wired team also has a great montage video of Jobs talking about what he loved best:

10:19 Women have been a complicated issue with Jobs. Jobs’s first serious girlfriend, a painter named Chris-Ann Brennan, became pregnant in 1977 and Jobs didn’t believe he was the father.

The mother initially raised their daughter on benefits. Jobs accepted his responsibilities after a court-ordered blood test proved he was the father.

in 1991 Jobs married Laurene Powell in1991, with whom he had a son and two daughters. They met at Stanford University while he was speaking at a class.

10:07Abdulfattah "John" Jandali -- Steve Jobs' biological father -- had no comment on the death of his son, with whom he had no relationship.

Jandali, 80, a Syrian-American Muslim and ex-political science professor, had earlier expressed his regret for giving his son up for adoption.

"I really don't have anything to say," said Jandali, vice president at Boomtown Hotel Casino and a former professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. "I know" the news.

In an interview withThe Sun in August, Jandali had expressed his desire to meet his son: "I live in hope that before it is too late he will reach out to me," he said. "Even to have just one coffee with him just once would make me a very happy man."

09:28 Fellow businessman Lord Alan Sugar has also tweeted his respects:@Lord_Sugar Gutted Steve Jobs died. We started our computer biz at same time and were competitors through the 80s.Great visionary. Sadly missed. RIP

09:22 It may have sold out before it even went on sale, but Barack Obama managed to get his hands on Apple's tablet device before it hit the shops - after being given one personally by Steve Jobs.

It is no secret that the President is an avowed Blackberry user, but he could be tempted by an early look at Apple's latest handset, which has voice control and a faster chip.

09:18 Actor Stephen Fry, an Apple fanatic who is thought to personally own dozens of Macs and iPhones, has tweeted:@stephenfry Woke to the news of Steve Jobs's death. He changed the world. I knew him a little and admired him entirely. Love to Apple and his family.

09:15 Fans around the world react to the news of his death:

09:10 The 317 Apple patents that list Steven P. Jobs among the group of inventors offers a glimpse at his legendary say over the minute details of the company’s products — from the company’s iconic computer cases to the glass staircases that are featured in many Apple stores.The New York Times has this interactive graphic.

Few if any business leaders could command such respect, awe and affection and be associated with a product in the same way as Steve Jobs and Apple.

Like the death of a star of entertainment or a much loved political leader, Jobs' death will affect populations across the world. But his own personal life added to the story. Jobs founded Apple, fell out with the company in spectacular manner only to return from the cold in triumph to lead the business back to renewed success in the iAge. But all the time he was not just battling for commercial success but also for his health. A cancer sufferer, the illness eventually claimed him.

08:47 The changing face of technology and one of its finest inventors:

A friend explained that computers would change all that forever; making it easier and quicker to produce, store and transmit copy. It all sounded rather technical to a Luddite like me. But I was impressed with the Apple Macintosh Classic. It was easy to use, with little or no need for technical training or back-up because the answer to every problem was always somewhere on the screen, and so I bought one in 1990.

08:37 The president of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, has just said:@MedvedevRussiaEPeople like Steve Jobs change our world. My sincere condolences to his loved ones and to everyone who admired his intellect and talent

08:34 CEO and founder of digital music service Spotify, Daniel Ek, tweets his respects:@eldsjalThank you Steve. You were a true inspiration in so many parts of my life, both personal and professional. My hat off to our time's Da Vinci.

While Apolline Arnaud, 12, a neighbour of Steve Jobs, writes a message on the pavement in front of Jobs' home in Palo Alto, California:

08:30 Samsung has called rival Steve Jobs an "innovative spirit" who will be remembered forever.

Yesterday Samsung said it would file court injunctions seeking to block the sale of Apple's latest iPhone. The smartphone giants are locked in an intensifying patent fight.

But today hatchets were buried and Samsung credited Jobs with "introducing numerous revolutionary changes to the information technology industry."

It said Jobs' "innovative spirit and remarkable accomplishments will forever be remembered by people around the world."

08:25 Head of TechnologyShane Richmondhas found this unaired version of Apple's 'genius' commercial, with Jobs narrating:

08:20 Digital editor Edward Roussel has more on how Apple shares are fairing:@edwardrousselApple shares drop 3% in European trading. Big question is whether Apple can retain top talent. Loyalty was to Jobs personally. #SteveJobs

08:16Martin Strydom from our business desk says Apple shares are trading down 3.3pc in Germany, after falling as much as 5.3pc earlier.

08:11 Twitter struggled tokeep up with the volume of commentsin the early hours of this morning, as users deluged the micro-blogging site to mourn the technology giant's death.

08:05 Jobs' death has caused a public outpour of grief. Here one fan sits outside the Apple Store on West 66th Street in New York after hearing of his death.

08:04 The man in his own words: "Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful … that's what matters to me." – Wall Street Journal 1993

07:54 Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has said: "Steve, thank you for being a mentor and a friend. Thanks for showing that what you build can change the world. I will miss you."

07:40 This lost video from 1984 shows the magic moment a young Steve Jobs introduced the "insanely great" original Macintosh computer.

07:35 One Telegraph commenter has left this moving tribute on our blog below:

markfour says: "After suffering a stroke and finding myself slowly going brain dead my son in law introduced me to Apple. Now at the age of 74 I am on to my fifth computer, third Nikon camera and alive as I can be at 74. Thanks to Steve and all at Apple and Nikon."

07:31 Apple fans in Hong Kong are laying flowers in memory of Jobs at the company's recently opened store in the city.

While Candles, flowers, and an iPhone with Steve Jobs photo displayed outside the Apple Store at West 66th Street in New York.

@emmabarnettSteve Jobs contributed more to the way we listen to music, watch movies & communicate with our friends than most people ever realise. The iPod generation's engimatic creator has gone #apple

07:18 In addition to his work at Apple, Steve Jobs was also a member of Disney’s board and its largest shareholder, thanks to the sale of Pixar to the Mouse house in January 2006.

Bob Iger, CEO and president of Disney, released a statement expressing his thoughts and sadness on the passing of Steve Jobs.

Steve Jobs was a great friend as well as a trusted advisor. His legacy will extend far beyond the products he created or the businesses he built. It will be the millions of people he inspired, the lives he changed, and the culture he defined. Steve was such an “original,” with a thoroughly creative, imaginative mind that defined an era. Despite all he accomplished, it feels like he was just getting started. With his passing the world has lost a rare original, Disney has lost a member of our family, and I have lost a great friend. Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife Laurene and his children during this difficult time.

Steven Spielberg, one of the founders of Pixar rival DreamWorks Animation,has released the following statement:

“Steve Jobs was the greatest inventor since Thomas Edison. He put the world at our fingertips.”

07:10 Lance Ulanoff, the chief editor of technology website Mashable, says the news of Jobs' death felt like a slap in the face.There it was: On Twitter. In my email. On a phone call. Steve Jobs, the tech industry’s one true icon, was gone — taken from us far too soon, at the age of 56.

Say what you will about the dynamic maverick who built and rebuilt Apple over the course of four decades, but Steve Jobs was a visionary. A maker of things. A doer who intimately understood the excitement of a new product. How the interchange of 1s and 0s could produce a sublime piece of software. Steve Jobs got all this. We admired him for it. Some loved him for it. None of us will forget him for it.

'Where will we find another one,' Steve Wozniak asked of the man he co-founded Apple with 35 years ago.

Jobs is among a handful of people who have built companies that both reinvent industries and change the wider world. Here in the US Thomas Edison and Henry Ford are others. Wozniak added that no one could have predicted the success of Apple, which he and Jobs established in a garage in Los Altos, California, at a time of great political and economic uncertainty.

07:00 US President Barack Obama President Barack Obama also paid tribute to Jobs in a statement, saying "the world has lost a visionary".

Steve was among the greatest of American innovators - brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and talented enough to do it.

He transformed our lives, redefined entire industries, and achieved one of the rarest feats in human history: he changed the way each of us sees the world.

The world has lost a visionary. And there may be no greater tribute to Steve's success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented.

06:34 Even competitors, who watched as Apple's sales took off over the past decade, have posted messages of admiration:

Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie, co-CEOs of Blackberry-maker Research in Motion: "Steve Jobs was a great visionary and a respected competitor."

Dell Inc. founder and CEO Michael Dell: "Today the world lost a visionary leader, the technology industry lost an iconic legend and I lost a friend and fellow founder."

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates: "For those of us lucky enough to get to work with Steve, it's been an insanely great honor. I will miss Steve immensely."

06:32 Marks of respect have started to flow from around the world. "iSad" is now a trending topic on Twitter. While Mac Users Group Mexico released a statement that concluded, "Let's breathe deeply and say VIVA STEVE JOBS!"

06:27TechChrunch's John Biggs have given their reflections on the death of "one of the greatest thinkers" of this generation:

It’s been a hard night and Erick and I thought it would be fitting to reflect a bit on Steve Jobs and his legacy. We’re both understandably crushed by the news but rather than look back we wanted to look forward, forward to what comes next in a world without one of its greatest thinkers.

Steve Jobs is important to us because the gifts he gave mankind are innumerable. He gave us the gifts of elegance, of clarity, of drive. He gave us computers that spawned industries, phones that paid millions of salaries. He made it so I can Facetime from the road with my children before they go to bed and not have to worry about connection issues, downloads, fiddling. The stuff he made just works.

06:20 As the world wakes up to the news in England, Channel 4 News presenter Jon Snow pays his own tribute:@jonsnowC4As an unapologetic Apple fan I'm saddened to awaken to the news of Steve Jobs' death. One of the most innovative, leaders of our time.

05:45Richard Blackden, our Wall Street correspondent, has been to visit the Apple Store on New York's Fifth Avenue. He writes:

Apple's store at the corner of Fifth Avenue and 59th Street in Manhattan is the only one in America, and possibly in the world, that's open 24 hours. Arriving there at about 11:30pm, there was only a crowd of 20 or so people, which I was told had been closer to 50 or so an hour earlier.

'I was at work when I find out and felt I wasn't going to relax if I just went home,' said Nick Wynja, a product director at a technology start up in New York. Wynja said he put some thoughts down on a notepad and left it as one of the growing number of tributes to Jobs.

Another New Yorker who had come out was Marc Georges, a student, who said he had been surprised at his reaction to the death of someone he's never met even though he was a fan of Apple's products. While the crowd was relatively small, it offered a poignant reminder that Jobs was much more than the chief executive of just another company.

05:22 There is reportedly a sombre mood at Apple's Cupertino headquarters in California, where flags are flying at half mast. A group of mourners has gathered on the lawn outside the building where a man is playing the bagpipes.

05:15 This image has been doing the rounds online. You might need to look carefully...

04:50 Admirers of Steve Jobs continue to converge on Apple Stores across the world. In New York, the words "I love Steve" were inked onto some hoardings outside the Fifth Avenue store, and outside other branches in the US and beyond flowers, candles and cards have been placed by fans of the Apple co-founder.

At the downtown San Francisco Apple store, people held up pictures of Jobs on their iPads and taped greeting cards and post-it notes to the store window saying "thank you Steve" and "I hate cancer." There were also candles and red apples left outside.

A young woman writes "thank you" in lipstick at the Santa Monica Apple Store

Built around the inspiration of its co-founder, Apple will be a company in mourning. In a memo to Apple's staff announcing his death, Mr Cook said that 'those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.'

04:17The Washington Post is running a touching piece about the impact of Steve Jobs, saying he gave a whole generation a glimpse into the future.

03:55 Here are some interesting accounts of what it was like to know Steve Jobs personally. AtAllThingsD.com Walt Mossberg details The Steve I Knew and Fastcompany.com has compiled a series of stories titled The First Time I Met Steve Jobs.

03:45 More tributes for Steve Jobs:

Larry Page, CEO of Google:

"He was a great man with incredible achievements and amazing brilliance. He always seemed to be able to say in very few words what you actually should have been thinking before you thought it. His focus on the user experience above all else has always been an inspiration to me."

Steve Wozniak, Apple co-founder:

"People sometimes have goals in life. Steve Jobs exceeded every goal he set himself."

Paul Allan, co-founder of Microsoft:

"We've lost a unique tech pioneer and auteur who knew how to make amazingly great products. Steve fought a long battle against tough odds in a very brave way. He kept doing amazing things in the face of all that adversity. As someone who has had his own medical challenges, I couldn't help but be encouraged by how he persevered."

Steve Case, Founder of AOL:

"I feel honored to have known Steve Jobs. He was the most innovative entrepreneur of our generation. His legacy will live on for the ages."

03:40Googlehas added the line "Steve Jobs, 1955 - 2011" to its homepage. The Apple founder's name links through to the Apple website.

03:20 As well as making online tributes, admirers of Jobs have been converging on Apple Stores around the world to pay their respects. Fans have congregated outisde the store on New York's Fifth Avenue, writing notes on the scaffolding, and a bunch of flowers had been laid outside the Apple Store in Sydney.

03:15 Here is Barack Obama's statement in full:

"Michelle and I are saddened to learn of the passing of Steve Jobs. Steve was among the greatest of American innovators - brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world and talented enough to do it.

By building one of the planet's most successful companies from his garage, he exemplified the spirit of American ingenuity. By making computers personal and putting the Internet in our pockets, he made the information revolution not only accessible, but intuitive and fun. And by turning his talents to storytelling, he has brought joy to millions of children and grown-ups alike.

Steve was fond of saying that he lived every day like it was his last. Because he did, he transformed our lives, redefined entire industries and achieved one of the rarest feats in human history: He changed the way each of us sees the world.

The world has lost a visionary. And there may be no greater tribute to Steve's success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented. Michelle and I send our thoughts and prayers to Steve's wife, Laurene, his family, and all those who loved him."

03:03Twitter has been flooded with reaction to Jobs' death. The site initially struggled with the deluge of tweets. At one point, five of the site's top 10 trending topics were related to Jobs: RIP Steve Jobs, ThankYouSteve, iHeaven, iClouds and Only 56.

Mattchew03wrote: "It's crazy to think about how many people are sharing the news of Steve Jobs's death using devices he invented."

02:55 US President Barack Obama hasremembered Jobs as a visionary and great American innovator.

"Steve was among the greatest of American innovators - brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and talented enough to do it," he said in a statement.

02:50 Here's the view on Jobs' legacy from inside the electronics industry. Computerworldsays Jobs was a man of conviction who left an indelible mark on computing and that the sector will never be the same again.

02:40The Wall Street Journal has republished Jobs' well-known 2005 commencement address at Standford University, in which he reflected on life, career and mortality:

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."

02:07The New York Timeshas a fascinating piece detailing the Apple patents that list Steve jobs as their inventor.

02:02 Here is the text of the email that Apple CEO Tim Cook sent to staff to announce Jobs' death:

Team, I have some very sad news to share with all of you. Steve passed away earlier today.

Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.

We are planning a celebration of Steve’s extraordinary life for Apple employees that will take place soon. If you would like to share your thoughts, memories and condolences in the interim, you can simply email rememberingsteve@apple.com.

No words can adequately express our sadness at Steve’s death or our gratitude for the opportunity to work with him. We will honor his memory by dedicating ourselves to continuing the work he loved so much.

Microsoft Corp co-founder and chairman Bill Gates used the Apple co-founder's own words in his tribute.

For those of us lucky enough to get to work with him, it's been an insanely great honor,'' Gates said in an e-mailed statement. "I will miss Steve immensely.''

"Insanely great'' was of one of Jobs' favorite expressions.

"The world rarely sees someone who has had the profound impact Steve has had, the effects of which will be felt for many generations to come,'' Gates said.

"Steve and I first met nearly 30 years ago, and have been colleagues, competitors and friends over the course of more than half our lives.

'I'm truly saddened to learn of (his) death," he said. 'Melinda and I extend our sincere condolences to his family and friends, and to everyone Steve has touched through his work.'

01:30 Jobs's family later released a statement saying he had died "peacefully surrounded by his family."In his public life, Steve was known as a visionary; in his private life, he cherished his family.

We are thankful to the many people who have shared their wishes and prayers during the last year of Steve's illness.

We are grateful for the support and kindness of those who share our feelings for Steve. We know many of you will mourn with us, and we ask that you respect our privacy during our time of grief.

01:25 A further statement from the company said: "Steve's brilliance, passion and energy were the source of countless innovations that enrich and improve all of our lives. The world is immeasurably better because of Steve."

"His greatest love was for his wife, Laurene, and his family. Our hearts go out to them and to all who were touched by his extraordinary gifts."

01:15Steve Jobs' has died aged 56 after a long battle with cancer. His death was announced by Applein a statementsaying: "Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being.

"Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor.

"Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple."